Inspiring and building an online community

Inspiring & building an online community

Tweet me - @helen_osborne

Email me – helen@justgiving.com

Hello!

What we’ll cover…

•  Why is social media so important

•  Getting started on social

•  Creating a content strategy

•  Practical content tips

•  Useful free tools available

•  What’s worked for us

•  You + us = BFFs

Why is social media so important?    

Some numbers… 1.23 billion monthly

active users  

284 million active users

200 million users

70 million users

40 million users  

540 million users

52% of the population is on Facebook,

with 70% returning every day  

1 million tweets every

day from 600,000 daily

users  

€80 million donated via Facebook integration in the last 12 months

Donations

from Twitter went up by

70% in 2013 compared

to 2012

The average donation

from Facebook is

€24

The average donation

from Twitter is €28

Getting started on social media

What channels should you be on?  

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q  ‘About’ section q Cover photo 851 x 315 q Profile photo 400 x 400

q Content plan

Facebook page checklist  

q  ‘About’ section q Cover photo 1500x500 q Profile photo 400x400

q Content plan

Twitter profile checklist  

§  Find those who use hashtags related to your cause

§  Use tools like Followerwonk to find potential influencers

Identify people interested in your cause  

Creating a content strategy

Get to know your audience  

Who are your fans and followers? Where are they from? How old are they? Are the majority men or women? Look at your - §  Facebook insights §  Twitter analytics

Look at what’s worked before  

What has performed well? Where are you engagement spikes? Let this inform the different types of content you post

Different types of content

Different types of content  

Stories

Inspirational stories is perfect social content. As a charity, you have lots of great stories to tell.

Tell people about your: §  Amazing fundraisers §  Beneficiaries §  Volunteers §  Service provider

Asks

§  A strong, emotive message is crucial – show people the impact of their support

“By running the Dublin marathon, you’ll be pioneering life-saving research that will save more lives like Sue’s.”

§  Have clear CTAs with minimal steps & THINK MOBILE

§  Be timely and relevant Attribute your asks to current events, campaigns

or awareness days

Send people to an appeal page, an online petition or registration form

Information

§  Use engaging content such as imagery and videos to tell people about important information

Thank you

§  Thanking your supporters on social media is a great way to publicly acknowledge the difference they’ve made

§  Focus on impact and tell real-

life stories

Some practical content tips

Post images §  Always post with an image. §  Keep an eye on recommended sizes.

Currently we post – Facebook 940 x 788 Twitter – 1024 x 512

§  Add text to your images to give

context

§  THINK MOBILE

Keep text short §  THINK MOBILE – you don’t want a ‘continue

reading’ button in your posts

§  Aim for 140 -160 characters - Posts have up to 60% more engagement if they are under 160 characters*

§  Tweets with 90 – 100 characters get more retweets

(Remember, images take up 23 characters)   *Source: SocialStack

Use CTAs (calls to action) §  Be clear about what you want people to do - don’t

confuse with multiple CTAs §  When you want people to engage, use social actions

– like, comment, share, retweet §  For offsite actions, be clear what you want people to

do – register for the event, sign our petition, donate to our appeal – THINK MOBILE

When you’re not creating awesome content…  

§  Connect with your

supporters

§  Respond to comments and mentions

§  When you see

someone supporting your charity, say thank you

Make your community feel loved

Pay attention to trends §  Keep an eye on what people

are talking about – and not just conversations related

to your cause. §  Be ready to react. Content doesn’t need to be 100% polished to join the conversation.

Useful free tools available

Creating content

§  Your smartphone

§  Photo edit tools like GIMP

§  Instagram

§  Vine

Moderating your channels

§  Hootsuite

§  Tweetdeck

§  Radian 6

§  Sprout Social

§  Self-moderation

What’s worked for us

We celebrate the amazing things

people do for the causes they care

about  

Someone inspiring  

Doing an awesome challenge  

With an amazing back story  

Timely and relevant  

Encourage sharing  

Importance of sharing

People are inspired by their friends. Your supporters sharing is absolutely key Every time someone takes an actions, encourage them (and make it easy!) to share THINK MOBILE – Double the amount of mobile donors share their donation Compared to desktop

That’s why we’ve made sharing part of the JG process

3 million people have inspired their friends by…

Sharing a donation  

Sharing a friend’s page  

Sharing an update

Key things  

Social media is about

conversations and building relationships

Great content is

key

THINK MOBILE

You + JG = BFFs

We want to share your stories

We want to promote your amazing fundraisers and hard working service providers. We’re looking for… §  Inspiring people, doing awesome challenges,

with great back stories

or

§  Someone who does outstanding work for your charity

So email us: social@justgiving.com  

Thank you!